Wooden Knew How to Fertilize in the Garden

Tom Kenville, the longtime publicist at New York’s Madison Square Garden, recently recalled a Holiday Festival appearance by UCLA during the Lew Alcindor years.

At the time, Kenville worked as the Garden’s official scorer for college games.

Said Kenville: “During pregame warmups, (Coach John) Wooden walks over and says, ‘I understand you’re one of the outstanding scorers in America.’

“I said to him: ‘Why the snow job, coach? You’ve got Alcindor, for crying out loud.’ ”

Add Garden: The present Madison Square Garden is a no-smoking arena.

Kenville waxed nostalgic about its predecessor, recalling: “There was something about the old Garden the new one never quite captured. . . . I think it was the cigar smoke, the way it used to form a cloud up in the mezzanine.”

Trivia time: When last did the Chicago Cubs and White Sox have winning records in the same year?

She meant well: One of San Francisco Chronicle columnist Herb Caen’s well-placed sources recently called in an item involving Joe Montana, his wife, Jennifer, and their children during lunch at a hotel on Maui.

Wrote Caen: “Looking at Joe’s bandaged hand, a motherly waitress gushed over him. ‘Oh, you poor thing. What happened to the hand?’

“Joe: ‘I broke it playing football.’

“Waitress: ‘Now, now, aren’t you a little old to be playing football?’

“Joe, with a sheepish smile: ‘You may be right,’ at which the crowd within earshot broke into loud laughter. The waitress, who obviously didn’t know who he was, looked appropriately startled.”

It had to happen: Reid Ryan, son of Nolan Ryan, baseball’s all-time strikeout leader, made his collegiate pitching debut Tuesday in a relief role for the University of Texas.

The first batter he faced was his friend Shayne Currin of Texas Arlington, who worked last summer as a bullpen catcher for Nolan’s team, the Texas Rangers.

Reid Ryan struck him out.

Trivia answer: 1972, when the Cubs, managed by Leo Durocher, finished 85-70, second in the National League East, and the White Sox, managed by Chuck Tanner, were 87-67, second in the American League West.

Quotebook: Boxing publicist Irving Rudd, on longtime friend Thomas Hearns’ frugality: “Tommy squeezes a nickel so tight, the Indian sits on the buffalo.”